You've gotta compare deaths, not confirmed cases, because cases are being so severely under-tested right now (especially in Sweden, which has a nearly 10% case fatality rate, indicating that they're probably only catching 1 case out of every 50, or more). Deaths are the most reliable statistic we have right now because they're the least likely to be under-reported (though they still suffer from that). Once this is all over and we can do population studies based on widespread blood antibody testing then we'll have better stats, but that's years out.

So, comparing the deaths per 10M population, Sweden is currently at 1,014, whereas North Carolina is at 114. So Sweden is suffering roughly one order of magnitude worse from the pandemic than North Carolina is at the moment. And keep in mind that North Carolina went into a shelter in place order over two weeks ago while Sweden hasn't yet, so there's a loooot more pending cases in Sweden's pipeline than NC's.